The Fairy-Land of Science · Lecture X, part 3 · Part 10: Lecture X: Bees and flowers
29. Violets, pea flowers, orchids, and the end of the journey
Goal: Your child can work a pea-family flower with a pencil the way a bee does, and can say what Buckley's ten lectures taught about nature's "fairies".
You'll need
- A pea-family flower: sweet pea, clover, vetch, bean flower or bird's-foot trefoil (a common roadside weed)
- A violet if any are in flower
- Optional: a store-bought potted orchid and a toothpick
- A pencil and a magnifying glass
- Science notebook and pencils
What's in the book
Pages 226 to 237. The violet's pollen falling like dust from a little box when a bee shakes it; the bird's-foot trefoil, whose wings and keel push down under the bee's weight to show the pollen; the early orchis, whose pollen-masses stick to a bee's head like little clubs and bend forward as they dry; how bees and flowers help each other; and Buckley's farewell to the fairy-land of science.
The lesson, step by step
Hook question
SaySome flowers are like a magician's box, with secret doors and springs. Shall we open some?
The violet
Read page 228.
if you look at the veins of the flower, you will find that they all point towards the spur where the honey is to be found
If you have violets, find the lines and the little spur at the back. The violet's dry pollen falls down onto a bee like dust from a shaken box.
Try it: the pea flower
Read page 228 and look at Fig. 62.
In all these flowers the top petal (sta, Fig. 62) stands up like a flag to catch the eye of the insect, and for this reason botanists call it the "standard."
Find the standard (the flag), the two wings at the sides, and the keel (shaped like the bottom of a boat). Press down gently on the wings with the pencil, as a bee's weight does. The keel goes down too, and the pollen and the tip of the pistil peek out! Let go and they hide again.
The orchid's trick
Read or tell pages 230 to 233. In the early orchis, the pollen is stuck together in two little clubs with sticky feet. When a bee pushes in, they glue onto her head, and as they dry they bend forward, just right to touch the next flower.
Optional, with an adult: on a store-bought orchid, touch a toothpick gently to the small cap under the top of the column in the middle of the flower. The pollen often comes away on the toothpick as tiny yellow balls. (Don't pick wild orchids; many are rare and protected.)
Helping each other
Read page 234.
And so we learn that even among insects and flowers, those who do most for others, receive most in return.
The flower feeds the bee; the bee carries the flower's pollen. Neither one knows it, but each helps the other.
The end of the journey
Read page 236.
But at least we have passed through the gates, and have learnt that there is a world of wonder which we may visit if we will; and that it lies quite close to us, hidden in every dewdrop and gust of wind, in every brook and valley, in every little plant or animal.
Look back through the science notebook together. Your child chooses a favorite "fairy" (sunbeams, the air, water, ice, sound, the life of a plant, the coal, the bees) and tells it back.
Buckley's last words speak of the Great Creator; read them as your family wishes.
What we know now
Buckley says there were no flying insects in the coal forests. In fact there were: giant dragonfly-like insects with wings more than two feet across! But flowers came much later, and she was right that flowers and insects grew up together over a very long time, each shaping the other.
Afterwards
Notice it this week: try the pencil trick on clover, sweet peas or bean flowers. Keep looking at every flower you pass: who visits it, and how does its pollen travel?
Tip
Clover heads are full of tiny pea-family flowers; pull one floret out and try the pencil on it under the magnifying glass. Next in the science sequence come Agnes Giberne's books on the stars and on the rocks.
Answers to the book's problems
Pea flower parts: the standard (top petal, like a flag), the two wings, and the keel. Pressing the wings pushes the keel down and uncovers the pollen. Flowers and bees help each other: the flower gives honey, and the bee carries its pollen.
Worked out for this site from the scan. If a number in your copy differs, trust the book.